Sunday, Mar 1, 2015 at 3:56 AM

Getty Images
Venezuelan authorities released four missionaries from North Dakota after detaining them and questioning them for several days, a pastor at their church told The Associated Press. The missionaries were detained on Wednesday and questioned, although it was unclear why the missionaries were being detained, said Bruce Dick, the lead pastor at Bethel Evangelical Free Church in Devils Lake. "They didn't fear for their lives or anything, it was just question after question," Dick said. Their detainment comes amid a chill in U.S.-Venezuelan relations: On Saturday, Venezuela announced it had banned a "terrorist list" of prominent U.S. citizens and politicians amid suspicion of espionage.
Get More at NBC News

http://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/national-international/294539341.html

294539341

Victor Arden Barnard, 53, who is on the U.S. most-wanted list for heinous sexual assault, has been arrested in Brazil, authorities said.

Sunday, Mar 1, 2015 at 2:32 AM

Victor Arden Barnard, 53, who is on the U.S. most-wanted list for allegedly sexually assaulting children, has been arrested in Brazil, authorities said Saturday. The self-professed minister was put on the list for allegedly molesting two girls in a "Maidens Group" at his religious fellowship in rural Minnesota. Barnard faces 59 counts of criminal sexual conduct when he is brought back to the states. Two women said they were among about 10 girls and young women who were chosen to live apart from their families in a camp where Barnard would sexually abuse them from the time they were teenagers to their early 20s, according to a criminal complaint. Barnard allegedly kept the girls isolated, and U.S. authorities have said he used religious coercion and intimidation to maintain his control over them, calling it cult-like behavior. He allegedly told one victim she would remain a virgin because he was a "man of God," according to a criminal complaint.
Get More at NBC News

http://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/national-international/294537321.html

294537321

Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro said on Saturday that his government had captured several Americans for "espionage," including a pilot, and had banned a number of prominent U.S. citizens from entering the...

Sunday, Mar 1, 2015 at 8:36 AM

Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro said on Saturday that his government had captured several Americans, including a pilot, and had banned a number of prominent U.S. citizens from entering the country, NBC News reported. On the list of citizens banned, referred to as the "terrorist list", are George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, the former head of the CIA George Tenent and some members of Congress. Speaking during a rally, he said all Americans in the future will have to seek visas to visit the country. Maduro is reacting to similar measures the Obama administration put against a group of Venezuelan public officials. One of the people banned, U.S. Rep. Mario Diaz-Balart, was unimpressed: "I've always wanted to travel to a corrupt country that is not a free democracy. And now Castro's lap dog won't let me!" the Republican from Florida said in a tweet.
Get More at NBC News

http://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/national-international/294534441.html

294534441

An Egyptian court declared Hamas, the Islamist group which dominates the Gaza strip, as a "terrorist organization".

Saturday, Feb 28, 2015 at 9:35 PM

An Egyptian court declared Hamas, the Islamist group which dominates the Gaza strip, as a "terrorist organization". Hamas are still reeling from last summer's war with Israel and choked by an Israeli-Egyptian blockade set up in 2007. Egypt has been an impartial peace negotiator between Israel and parts of Palestine for years. "There is no doubt that Hamas is being pushed into the corner further and further," said Mkhaimar Abu Sada, a political science professor at Gaza's Al Azhar University. Hamas' relationship with Cairo has "reached a point of no return" and is unlikely to be salvaged, he said.
Get More at NBC News

http://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/national-international/294528271.html

294528271

The city of Cleveland has denied any wrongdoing in response to a wrongful death lawsuit brought by the lawyers of Tamir Rice's family last month.

Saturday, Feb 28, 2015 at 7:49 PM

The city of Cleveland has denied any wrongdoing in response to a wrongful death lawsuit brought by the lawyers of Tamir Rice's family last month. The 12-year-old boy was playing with a pellet gun before being fatally shot by police officers. The city wrote that Rice's injuries were caused by him failing to "exercise due care." In addition, complaint's brought on behalf of Rice's sister and mother, who were at the scene after the boy was shot, also "directly caused by their own acts" note the officers involved, the response said. In the claim brought on by Rice's family attorney, it says that police tackled Rice's sister to the ground and then placed her in a patrol car when she realized her brother was shot. Tamir's mother was then allegedly forced to decide whether to ride in the police car with her daughter or in the ambulance with her son.
Get More at NBC News

http://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/national-international/294524871.html

294524871

Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul won his third straight Conservative Political Action Conference presidential straw poll which is an early indicator of which 2016 candidates conservatives will endorse.

Saturday, Feb 28, 2015 at 6:57 PM

Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul won his third straight Conservative Political Action Conference presidential straw poll which is an early indicator of which 2016 candidates conservatives will endorse. Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker won approval of 21 percent of the 3,007 while Paul received 26 percent. While the poll is an early sign of likely conservative candidates, it rarely proves an accurate indicator of who will win the Republican presidential nomination. Paul's father, Rep. Ron Paul, won the straw poll in 2011. Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney won the nomination the following year. Romney won the straw poll in 2007 and then fell to Sen. John McCain in the 2008 primaries.
Get More at NBC News

http://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/national-international/294523801.html

294523801

Sierra Leone's Vice President Samuel Sam-Sumana has placed himself in a 21-day quarantine after his bodyguard died of Ebola.

Saturday, Feb 28, 2015 at 6:39 PM

Sierra Leone's Vice President Samuel Sam-Sumana has placed himself in a 21-day quarantine after his bodyguard died of Ebola. Sam-Sumana's bodyguard John Koroma died earlier this week. "I have decided to be put under quarantine because I do not want to take chances and I want to lead by example," the vice president told Reuters. "I am very well and showing no signs of illness." The virus has killed nearly 10,000 people in Sierra Leone, Liberia, and Guinea during a year-long epidemic but cases have decreased sharply in recent weeks. Sam-Sumana said his entire staff will also be placed under observation and anyone showing symptoms of the disease would be tested. The vice president is the country's first senior government figure to subject himself to a voluntary quarantine.
Get More at NBC News

http://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/national-international/294509121.html

294509121

The death of an unarmed 17-year-old Denver, Colorado, girl who was shot by police was ruled a homicide, according to a medical examiner's report released Friday showing that she suffered four gunshot wounds,...

Saturday, Feb 28, 2015 at 5:26 PM

AP
The death of an unarmed 17-year-old Denver, Colorado, girl who was shot by police was ruled a homicide, according to a medical examiner's report released Friday showing that she suffered four gunshot wounds, NBC News reported. Jessica Hernandez's Jan. 26 death sparked protests and is under investigation by the Denver District Attorney's Office. The Denver Police Department said officers opened fire on Hernandez when she drove a stolen car toward them, but the family's lawyer, Qusair Mohamedbhai, said the autopsy tells a different story. He told NBC News on Saturday that the left-to-right wound path and trajectory of the bullets that struck Hernandez "undermine the version of the events put forth by the Denver Police Department."
Get More at NBC News

http://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/national-international/294504961.html

294504961

Russia's top investigative authority said Saturday they were looking at whether the shooting death of prominent opposition leader Boris Nemtsov was aimed at destabilizing the country, NBC News reported.

Sunday, Mar 1, 2015 at 1:11 AM

AP
Russia's top investigative authority said Saturday they were looking at whether the shooting death of prominent opposition leader Boris Nemtsov was aimed at destabilizing the country, NBC News reported. Russia's Investigative Committee said in a statement that several motives for the killing were being considered including "Islamic extremism," Ukraine conflict or his personal life. In a recent interview, Nemtsov had said he feared Russian President Vladimir Putin would have him killed because of his opposition to the war in Ukraine. Nemtsov, 55, who served as first deputy prime minister under President Boris Yeltsin in the 1990s, was gunned down as he crossed a bridge in view of the Kremlin, police said.
The committee was also looking at the possibility that Nemtsov, who was shot as he walked across a bridge in Moscow earlier on Saturday, was linked to Islamic extremism, the Ukraine conflict or his personal life.
Get More at NBC News

http://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/national-international/294495641.html

294495641

The number of Westerners who have joined ISIS in Syria and Iraq continues to grow, according to U.S. officials, and now stands at 3,400.

Saturday, Feb 28, 2015 at 9:06 AM

AP
The number of Westerners who have joined ISIS in Syria and Iraq continues to grow, according to U.S. officials, and now stands at 3,400. Those officials hope recent military successes against ISIS will help stem the flow of fighters. Gen. James Clapper, the director of national intelligence, told Congress Thursday ISIS now has 20,000 foreign fighters, up from 16,000 last fall, out of a total fighting force of as many as 31,000. Clapper's testimony also upped the number of U.S. citizens who've traveled or attempted to travel to Syria. Six months ago, the number was estimated at 100, then more recently 150. On Thursday, Clapper put the number at roughly 180.
Get More at NBC News

http://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/national-international/294492581.html

294492581

A new survey from China's State Forestry Administration suggests the country's wild giant pandas are showing encouraging signs of population growth, The Associated Press reported.

Saturday, Feb 28, 2015 at 7:45 AM

A new survey from China's State Forestry Administration suggests the country's wild giant pandas are showing encouraging signs of population growth, The Associated Press reported. The panda population has grown by 268 since the last survey ended in 2003, making a total of 1,864 pandas in the wild, according to the latest survey, which began in 2011 and took three years to complete. China's creation of 27 new preservation areas has contributed to growth of the pandas' numbers, but the survey said economic development remains a threat to the rare animals and their habitat.
Get More at NBC News

http://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/national-international/294491661.html

294491661

The frozen-over Northeast has endured its coldest month in a century of weather record-keeping, NBC News reported.

Saturday, Feb 28, 2015 at 2:56 AM

Getty Images
A new analysis of U.S. Census data suggests that a family's economic status has a stronger influence on children's well-being than the marital status of parents, NBC News reported. The report, conducted by the Council on Contemporary Families (CCF), suggests that lower household incomes in the United States are causing a decline in marriage rates and fueling a rise in single-parent households. "Marriage isn't magic," Shannon Cavagh, a professor and expert affiliated with CCF, told NBC News. "There is a clear economic bar to marriage and to the extent people cannot meet that bar they are less inclined to marry."
Get More at NBC News

http://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/national-international/294434141.html

294434141

An environmental group sued the U.S. government claiming the agency had failed to heed warnings about the dangers to monarch butterflies posed by glyphosate, the key ingredient in Monsanto's "Roundup", a widely...

Friday, Feb 27, 2015 at 5:27 PM

An environmental group sued the U.S. government claiming the agency had failed to heed warnings about the dangers to monarch butterflies posed by glyphosate, the key ingredient in Monsanto's "Roundup", a widely used herbicide. The Natural Resources Defense Council said the Environmental Protection Agency failed to respond to a petition filed more than a year ago to limit the use of gylphosate. "The longer EPA delays, the greater the risk we could lose the monarch migration," Sylvia Fallon, an NRDC senior scientist said in a statement.
Get More at NBC News

http://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/national-international/294440141.html

294440141

Russian opposition politician Boris Nemtsov, a key critic of President Vladimir Putin, was shot dead in Moscow early Saturday, just a day before a planned protest against Putin's rule.

Friday, Feb 27, 2015 at 6:46 PM

Russian opposition politician Boris Nemtsov, a key critic of President Vladimir Putin, was shot dead in Moscow early Saturday, just a day before a planned protest against Putin's rule. A spokesman for Russia's equivalent of the FBI told NBC News that somebody in a car fired seven shots at Nemtsov as he strolled with a woman on a bridge near the Kremlin; four of those shots hit him. Putin, whom Nemtsov had relentlessly criticized, will personally oversee the investigation into his death, the Kremlin said. Nemtsov had assailed Putin for what he called his government's inefficiency, corruption and policy toward Ukraine, which has strained Russia's relationship with the West.
Get More at NBC News